With some creative planning and forethought, these times don’t need to be stressful, if we keep looking far enough down the road. Many of us with budget and time restraints may just need to design our stages in, well, phases.

With some creative planning and forethought, these times don’t need to be stressful, if we keep looking far enough down the road. Many of us with budget and time restraints may just need to design our stages in, well, phases.

The January-February 2018 issue of Worship Facilities Magazine offers articles about the many steps a church had to take in the aftermath of a fire, and another involving a church making the jump to 4K.

Sound System Design: Determine Right Type of Speaker for Space

The normal logic is that what they are looking to replace is old, and it needs to be upgraded, to where the new system will sound great and make everything better.

Many churches, including Flatiron Community Church's West Campus in Genessee, Colorado, have opted to install line array speakers as part of their sound system design in their worship space, but at other churches, have found that point source boxes have proven to be the preferred alternative.

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Many churches, including Flatiron Community Church's West Campus in Genessee, Colorado, have opted to install line array speakers as part of their sound system design in their worship space, but at other churches, have found that point source boxes have proven to be the preferred alternative.

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The January-February 2018 issue of Worship Facilities Magazine offers articles about the many steps a church had to take in the aftermath of a fire, and another involving a church making the jump to 4K.

Mike Anderson · December 11, 2017

Let’s take a few minutes and talk a little about sound system design.

Keep in mind that this is by no means a comprehensive article on the subject, but more of an overview to get our minds thinking about starting points.

To a large degree, your room and budget will eliminate many options for you, which is a good thing since there are thousands of options to choose from.

Over the years, I have designed and installed many audio/visual systems for churches, and at various other venues. One of the things that strikes me when meeting with people to talk about implementing a new system in their space, is they don’t really know why they want a new system or what they are trying to accomplish with such an upgrade.

The normal logic is that what they are looking to replace is old, and it needs to be upgraded, to where the new system will sound great and make everything better.

Knowing that, some of the questions you should be asking yourself:
• What do I not like about the current system?
• What is the current system not doing well that I wish it would and I would like the new system to address?
• How long do you think that a new system will be used, before it is likely to be replaced?
• How do you think the space will be used in that time?

In general, if this is for your main sanctuary, you should be aiming for the update to last 10 years, to make it a worthwhile return of investment. You also must think about how your area of ministry will grow and change over the course of the next 10 years. This is where praying about these things and bringing them to God and seeking his guidance and direction is crucial.

Another aspect that one must take into account is, what is your budget, in other words what can you afford to spend?

It doesn’t really matter if “Company A” makes a better speaker than “Company B,” if you can’t afford it. Having a budget is particularly helpful in determining what products to consider as part of this planned system upgrade.

For the rest of this piece, we are going to discuss audio speakers, as it relates to system design. More specifically, we are going to talk about point source boxes and line array systems, and why either might be best suited for your space.

Before we do that, though, you need to make sure that you are addressing the acoustic needs of your space, or else it really doesn’t matter what you are putting in there.

Mike Anderson has for the past eight years worked full-time as both a technical director, and currently an assistant technical director, for two different churches. In addition, he has been both a professional drummer and audio engineer for the past 21 years. Working with many different artists along the way as a drummer, he has performed everything from jazz, rock, country, pop music. During this time, he also worked for different production companies and recording studios and started his own production company when living in Kansas City.

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The January-February 2018 issue of Worship Facilities Magazine offers articles about the many steps a church had to take in the aftermath of a fire, and another involving a church making the jump to 4K.

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